


i choose, i choose you

by GoldenTruth813



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: 8th year, Falling In Love, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-24
Updated: 2018-01-24
Packaged: 2019-03-09 02:14:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,027
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13471536
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GoldenTruth813/pseuds/GoldenTruth813
Summary: It’s not about who we fall in love with, but what we do about it that defines us.





	i choose, i choose you

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Español available: [i choose, i choose you - Traducción](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14165805) by [dari2210](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dari2210/pseuds/dari2210)



> Thank you unadulteratedstorycollector for the quick beta job. You’re the best, Kat! This is for skarhead who is as talented as she is lovely which is to say, a great deal. You’re incredibly special and I’m lucky to call you a friend. <3

The first time they kiss it is not perfect. Harry’s hands are shaking as they slide beneath Draco’s jumper, his breath smells like firewhiskey and treacle tart, and he looks unsure. It’s on the tip of Draco’s tongue to remind Potter that he doesn’t have to do anything he doesn’t want to, regardless of some stupid drinking game. But before he can speak Potter is crashing their lips together and it’s sloppy and a bit too forceful and Potter’s lips are chapped from spending all weekend flying.

Draco has never hated anyone as much as he does in that moment because only Potter could make the worst kiss of his life also the best one. Because Potter is too drunk to have any finesse, too inexperienced to know where to put his hands on another boy’s body, and yet his sincerity makes Draco weak in the knees. Potter might not have a single idea what he’s doing, but the knowledge that he’s doing it of his own free will has Draco coming in his pants as Potter presses him into the wall and sucks on his bottom lip.

There are kisses after that. Second and third and fourth kisses. 

The kissing gets better, more skilled. Potter figures out the best places to put his hands when they kiss - on Draco’s arse, or the tips of his fingers trailing down Draco’s stomach - but his sincerity never changes. Sometimes it takes Draco’s breath away to see the way Potter wants him. It shouldn’t be happening, but it does and it makes him feel a bit lightheaded.

The first time Potter goes down on him it’s behind a gnarled oak tree near the edge of the Quidditch pitch. They’d gone down for a seeker’s game while everyone else was still eating - a game which Draco had won - and yet as they’d landed on the ground after instead of looking defeated, Potter had looked victorious. Draco didn’t even realize what the other boy had in mind until Potter was dragging him behind the tree, pressing him down into the grass and undoing the laces on his trousers. Potter had looked beautiful then, the sunlight on his face, his hair windswept and his face full of so much life. Draco had squeezed his eyes shut then, unable to watch as Potter’s mouth had closed around his cock, bringing him off unbearably fast.

They’d stayed together like that, side by side in the grass for a long time. Potter had reached out, tangling their fingers atop the warm grass. Draco hadn’t been able to look at Potter’s face then, hadn’t been able to bring himself to see what was written there. He wasn’t ready to read the truth of what he might mean to Potter.

Sometimes Draco pretended he didn’t know what Potter wanted from him, purposely didn’t look at him from across the classroom or from the opposite side of the table during meals so he wouldn't have to react to the things Potter so clearly wanted to  _show_ him rather than tell him. 

Draco wasn’t sure what it meant, to fall in love with someone who made you want to be better than you were. Did they love you despite your faults, or did they love you hoping you would change? Draco didn’t think he wanted to fall in love.

Except weeks later, sometime between wondering and wanting, Draco realized he didn’t get to pick whether he would fall in love with Potter. It wasn’t about if, but  _when_. The only thing Draco had power over was what he did with it.

Suddenly it wasn’t about whether letting Potter love him would change things, but about what it would mean when he let himself love Potter back. Draco had spent so long feeling like love was a weakness, that it would be used against him or to mold him, he hadn’t stopped to wonder at what it would be like to accept it instead of fight against it.

It was not so hard he thought, a few days later, when he let his fingers slide across Potter’s cheek. It was not so hard to press him down into the mattress, to slide into Potter’s body and  _not_ look away, raising Potter’s hands above his head and closing his finger’s around Potter’s as he pressed inside the other boy’s body. 

It was not about owning or being owned; it was about belonging.

It was the soft way Potter huffed when Draco kissed the spot behind his neck or the way Potter’s hands would curl tightly into his robe when Draco kissed him in the middle of the Great Hall as if no one else mattered. It was the way his own name sounded falling from Potter’s mouth as if it was somehow both an answer and a plea; as if it was everything. It was the way Draco found himself thinking of sunshine and the smell of grass and a crooked smile when he closed his eyes, of their hearts, beating together as one - a tangle of arms and legs when they’re so close he doesn't know where he begins and Potter ends - and not of hearts breaking.

Draco knows he didn’t choose to fall in love with Harry Potter, but he chose to let himself be loved. He thinks that perhaps love might not be a choice, but he knows what you decide to do with it is. And the moment he knew that was the moment he knew with utter clarity that he would have chosen to love Harry if he could. But he thinks that just maybe its ok Harry chose him first. It was not, he knew then, about who started it but about choosing to continue it,  _together_.

Draco knows Harry never wanted to be special, never wanted to be important, but Draco knows what it is like to feel the world transformed by his existence. So he knows he will protect Harry, protect whatever this thing between them is - regardless of the challenges they might face -, with every breath he has.

Because love, he thinks, is not worth dying for but it is worth _living_ for. 


End file.
